LITHUANIA AND POLAND STRESS MUTUAL SECURITY.

The presidents of Lithuania and Poland, Agirdas Brazauskas and Aleksander Kwasniewski, and members of the two governments conferred March 5 and 6 in Vilnius on a wide range of political and security issues. The sides agreed to proceed from the principle that Lithuania’s and Poland’s security are inseparable, and the security of both countries is inseparable from that of Europe. They resolved to coordinate the two countries’ efforts toward joining the European Union and NATO, to establish joint airspace control, to allow mutual military overflights under an "open sky" policy, to form a joint battalion, to hold joint military exercises, to cooperate in building the Via Baltica highway and a modern railroad link between the two countries, and to oppose any corridor across their territories to Russia’s Koenigsberg/Kaliningrad exclave. The sides defined Lithuania’s Polish minority and Poland’s Lithuanian minority as bridges between the two countries. Poland will support Lithuania’s accession to the Central European Free Trade Agreement. Lithuania’s foreign and defense ministers, Povilas Gilis and Linas Linkevicius, described Poland as one of three pillars — the other two being the Nordic and the fellow Baltic countries — of Lithuania’s security during the country’s transition to NATO membership. (11)

Kyrgyz Prime Minister Critical of Russian Protectionism.